The sun is shining (well it did occasionally on the day) and what better way to while away a Sunday afternoon than wandering around a classic car show. For the typoholic, this also presents me another opportunity to indulge…

I have been sorting through some of my stuff recently and rediscovered a small collection of old GRAPHIS magazines. For those of you to young to remember, Graphis was a hugely influencial international design journal published in three languages from 1944 to 2004.

As a student in the 1980’s, I was attracted to the older magazines in the library archive, rather than the more current issues; to me they represented a broader, less technological design world, full of ideas, exporations and auteurs. I do not have many issues of GRAPHIS, but I treasure the ones I have…

The 1960’s and 70’s issues seemed full of more playful designs, unaffected by the current political and social environment that I was growing up in. I realise now just how much some of that work has stuck with me, and little of it had any effect on me back then; as a student, these were curious relics from the years before I was born. Alas.

Another example of the typography of Banks & Miles from 1960. Judging from the page numbers, this appears to be a reprint of an article in a design magazine but there is no identifing information which…

When in Rome…

Cartes de Visite originated in France but became a popular and fashionable fad throughout Europe during the Victorian era. As a result, there are many collectors of these accessible (but slightly wierd) photographic portraits of middle class Victorians, and quite a lot of information is available for the mildly interested.

For instance, the John E. Palmer elegantly scripted upon this card was one of two photographer brothers from Devon, and along with William Eastman Palmer (and five of his seven sons) who appeared to dominate the south west market.